New international shipping rates, another custom order and another Etsy treasury.

Last weekend the US Postal Service increased the shipping rates for international packages significantly. While the price for first class packages went up, in comparison the priority mail flat rates went up more. What I used to ship priority flat rate will now be shipped first class parcel if possible - I haven't changed all the shipping rates in my Etsy shop yet, for some things I have just taken international shipping back out as it's ridiculous to pay $23.95 for a priority mail flat rate envelope to Europe if the items costs (e.g.) $3.50. I'm working on it as time allows and so far this week there hasn't been much of that. Of course I didn't want to increase shipping ahead of time.

I mentioned the Hilo High School Craft Faire in an earlier post. One of my coworkers came by with his wife and a friend, and the wife really liked some of my lampwork beads.

He came to me the week after and asked would I make a necklace for her in time for Christmas. I had to redesign once because the seed beads went into the holes of the lampwork beads, but this is how it came out (click on the picture for a bigger one):

The lampwork is goldstone chips (worked too hot) on Moretti ivory and Moretti light teal - and I changed the clasp to a sterling silver one after taking the picture. It's strung on softflex as almost always, with 4mm crystal Swarovski bicones, 6/0 seed beads and twisted square liquid silver.

And my lilikoi seeds made it into another Etsy Treasury:

'Passion' by ursulasalcove

Inspired by the passion flower and my own passion for fiber arts, I hope this treasury inspires you to pursue your passion.

Lilikoi seeds - pur... hilobeads $7.00	Deep Purple Handwov... FortuneWeaves $50.00
Silk Ribbon Purple ... lornabateman22 $56.95	Vintage Charm Brace... MoonHollow $19.95
Cagoule feutre/soie... zregine $77.00	Winter Sale Purple ... folkowl $38.00
Passion Flower Neck... jewelrita $35.00	Needle Felting Wool... egprimitives $5.00
Purple Swarovski Cr... ProtectiveSpir... $60.00	Purple Passion Hand... VioletRose258 $27.00
Purple Passion Pin GypsyPurl $58.00	Sangria Throw/Wrap ... VanessaTCunnin... $750.00
Royal Purple and Go... sunrisehandwov... $80.00	Purple Passion Flow... Gypsyharte $38.00
8/0 Czech Glass See... PiecesParts $3.99

Treasury tool supported by the dog house

(and extra spaces again taken out by me. It's really easy - on a Linux/Unix system. You copy and paste into vi/vim, close the file, open in pico (or nano which is basically the same thing), justify with a ^J and copy back out of the result.)